Confusing Reality
by Zerodone
Summary: And just like that, the world was alright. Summer was alive, Raven never left her family, Beacon never fell, Vale wasn't in ruins and Yang and Ruby are two very confused children.
1. Chapter 1

The alarm clock dutifully blared it's obnoxious sound through the room, perfectly disrupting the peaceful slumber of the occupants of said room. As a response, Raven Branwen smashed the annoying invention with her fist, perfectly silencing it forever.

"That's the third one this week, Rav." mumbled the woman lying next to she couldn't care less about the now in pieces lying machine. Why humans just didn't orient themselves after the sun circle, she didn't know, but it would be a hell of a lot better to wake up by rays of sunshine than an annoying beeping sound.

"Shut up and get up Summer," Raven replied, burying her face into her pillow. "It's your turn."

"It's Taiyang's turn."

"Taiyang is on a mission." the black haired woman reminded the redhead.

Summer Rose groaned upon remembering that particular piece of information. Reluctantly the girl pushed herself off the bed, her shoulder length hair immediately obscuring her vision, falling all around her head. With a huff, she pushed her hair behind her shoulders. The woman threw the blanket off her body, revealing a light pink nightgown covering her body. Still groggy, Summer got off the bed and walked barefoot towards the door, which led to the hallway. Once there, she needed to blink a few times, as her eyes adjusted to the light shining through the window at the end of said hallway. They rarely put the blindfolds down outside of rooms where someone slept. The family lived pretty isolatedly, making invasion of privacy, not an issue. As for the Grimm, if they ever bothered attacking their little shack, blindfolds wouldn't really stop them.

Arriving downstairs at the kitchen, Summer firstly opened the window, allowing the fresh Summer air to come in. The irony of words wasn't lost on her and she chuckled a little over the fact. After inhaling some of the outside air, the woman started preparing breakfast for the rest of the family, minus Taiyang of course. Since the children were both heavy sleepers, Summer didn't bother being quiet, while preparing the table. Raven would probably complain again, but the redhead didn't care. She and Raven have fully fledged Huntresses, trained to kill at a moment's notice and always battle ready. A little bit of noise should be nothing to them.

About thirty minutes later the scent of coffee filled the kitchen and went all the way up to the second floor. Summer checked the time and saw that it was almost time to wake up their daughters. Almost. It wasn't like the little ones needed to go to school, no they were way too young for that. It was just a good idea to not spoil the children too much, even or maybe especially at such a young age. Well, to be honest, if things would go Summer's way, she'd spoil the children to death, but Raven had made some very good points (and threats) about what might happen if Ruby and Yang grew up that way. Worst case scenario, they'd act like the spoiled brats from Atlas.

Summer turned her head towards the stairs, when she heard Raven coming downstairs, still only wearing her own black nightgown. The scent of the coffee appeared to have done its work. The black haired woman walked towards the coffee machine and poured herself a cup of the black liquid, only to drink half of it almost immediately.

"I needed that," Raven said, letting out a content sigh. She leaned herself against the kitchen counter, looking over to her old friend.

"Got any plans for today?"

"Not really." Summer shrugged. "I've hoped Tai would be back by now. At this rate, one of us will need to take over his position at Signal until he comes back."

"I'll leave that one to you. The two troublemakers we have here are more than enough to keep me busy." Raven deadpanned, causing Summer to giggle.

"Aw, don't be like that." the red head lightly punched her longtime friend. "They're the best and you know it."

"Of course they're the best." Raven scoffed. "They're our kids, after all."

"True, true." Summer giggled. "But that doesn't mean that you have to train them every day until they can't walk anymore."

"I don't need to do that. They're both doing a pretty good job themselves. By the way, you aren't feeding Ruby secretly cookies, are you? Because I don't remember Yang being this active, when she was two years old."

"Of course not. My little gem just takes after me, that's all." The redhead winked.

"After you?" Raven raised an eyebrow. "The first year I knew you, you barely took off that cloak of yours, because you were so damn shy. I still don't get why they thought you would be the perfect candidate for being the team leader."

Summer pouted but didn't comment on it. She took another glance at the radio clock and saw that it was time to wake up the children.

"Well, wanna go up and wake up the beasties?"

"It's time already?" Raven asked, looking at the clock herself. "Wish time would slow down at least once a year." The woman commented, drinking the rest of her coffee. She placed the mug on the counter behind her and was about to go upstairs when she noticed someone already standing on top of the stairs. Through the wooden bars, the small half-sisters Yang Xiao Long and Ruby Rose were watching their respective mothers.

"Look who got up early," Raven commented with a small smile. Summer followed her partner's gaze and smiled as well upon seeing the children upstairs, still in their pajamas. Raven decided to walk upstairs and get the two to the breakfast table. Once there, she noticed that her own daughter was looking up at her with wide eyes as if she was surprised to see her. Ruby in the meantime was hiding behind her older sister, her tiny head ever so slightly sticking out from the side.

"Good morning, you two." Raven greeted the children. She held out her arm and wanted to go through her daughter's blond hair, however, Yang quickly ducked and sidestepped, which resulted in Raven accidentally touching Ruby's hair. The girl let out a high-pitched "EEEP" and quickly went behind Yang's back once again. Raven chuckled at the children's antics and knelt down in front of her daughter. The blond was still looking at Raven with widened eyes. In fact judging from her entire expression it almost looked like Yang had seen a ghost.

"Is something wrong my little dragon?" the raven-haired woman asked concerned. "Did you have a nightmare?" It was the most logical conclusion. Raven had seen her daughter acting off before and normally that was when her daughter accidentally did something stupid or when she had a nightmare. The blond child looked at her right arm for some reason and avoided answering the question. Her mother couldn't tell whether it was out of guilt or because her daughter was too scared to talk about it. Either way, by now Raven had enough experience as a mother to know that she had to do something.

Slowly the woman wrapped both arms around her daughter and pulled her into a soft hug. Yang gasped when her head suddenly was pressed against her mother's chest. At the same time, Raven began stroking through her daughter's hair.

Footsteps could be heard, as Summer Rose made her way up the stairs. Naturally, she witnessed everything from downstairs, but couldn't make heads or tails as to what was bothering her step-daughter. The younger mother looked over to her own daughter and saw her staring at Yang and Raven. The young girl's face displayed a mixture of emotions, fear, curiosity, and confusion being the most apparent.

"Ruby?" Summer spoke softly, getting the girl's attention. Her eyes widened just as much as Yang's did when she laid eyes upon her mother. If Summer hadn't been bothered before, she certainly was now. She had a few ideas of what was going on with her daughter but didn't want to jump to any conclusions. The woman decided to bend down and picked up her daughter in the process. Ruby didn't complain. She just kept staring at her mother's face, like it was the most unnatural thing in the world.

"Okay, my little Rose Petal. Time for breakfast." Summer announced, before walking down the stairs with her daughter in her arms.

Raven in the meantime broke up the hug, but still had her arms placed on Yang's shoulders. "What's bothering you, my little dragon? You know you can tell me anything."

Yang didn't answer. Instead, she touched both of her mother's hands and went over the back of them gently with her tiny fingers. In the meantime she had her gaze downcast, appearing as if she was lost in thought as to what to say to her mother. Said mother waited patiently for her daughter to make a move or speak up or both. Finally, after a couple of minutes, the blond looked up directly into her mother's eyes with a stoic expression. Inwardly Raven was taken by surprise, but on the outside, her expression didn't change. Years of training had helped her to conceal her emotions, as long as she wasn't angry anyway.

"...Mom?" Yang spoke quietly, her voice quivering a little bit.

"Yes, my little Dragon?"

Yang didn't answer immediately. From Raven's perspective, it seemed like the little girl was studying her face as if the black haired woman was hiding something and the blond was determined to find out what. Raven briefly wondered if perhaps Yang was playing some sort of game and she just didn't realize it. But before she could speak up, there was a high pitched scream coming from downstairs. Both mother and daughter whipped their heads around and found Ruby sitting in a high chair and soaked in chocolate milk, the cup still in her hand. Summer stood a few steps away, her hands clasped in front of her mouth, hiding a smirk. Ruby let out a cute: "Noooooo!", causing Yang and Raven to erupt into howls of laughter.

Summer barely managed to suppress her own laughing fit and took her daughter of the chair. "Looks like breakfast needs to wait. You young lady need a bath." But Ruby was too busy plucking her own clothes, than listening to her mother. And so without any fuss, Summer once again lifted up her daughter and carried her all the way to the bathroom.

Yang and Raven in the meantime managed to catch themselves from the unexpected comedy act, courtesy of Yang's younger sister and looked at each other again. It was like someone had pressed a switch and the blond's expression did an 180. Whereas a second prior the blond's face showed happiness and joy, it now expressed caution, doubt and a hint of fear.

By now Raven was lost to her daughter's behavior. Had she done something wrong? Did she upset her daughter in any way? The woman drew a blank on this category.

"...Are you real?"

Raven blinked a couple of times. Just where did THAT question came from?

"Of course I am." The woman replied, her voice showing a little edge. "Why wouldn't I be real?"

But just as she asked this question, her mind answered it for her. Yang obviously must have had some sort of nightmare. It included her probably not being real or something along those lines. That dream must have felt so real to the little girl that she now was thoroughly confused, maybe even having trouble distinguishing dream from reality.

"So you did have a bad dream," Raven revealed her deduction and wrapped her arms around Yang.

"Huh? Wha-?"

"Shh." Raven shushed her daughter, petting her head. "It's alright my little dragon. A dream can't hurt you. I'm here for you. Come on, let's get you something to eat. That will make you feel better."

In the meantime, Yang was pretty sure that she had lost her sanity thanks to the crippling wound she received during the fall of Beacon.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Well, since the first chapter was such a success, here's the second one. I just hope I'll get the pacing right.

"Oh Ruby, look how sticky your hair is." Summer mock-complained, inspecting her daughter's hair, which was still dripping chocolate milk from a few strands. The droplets, of course, landed on Summer's gown, meaning the woman would have to change afterward.

The little girl in Summer's arms shook her head, feeling uncomfortable from the touch of her mother. Said mother in return just smiled, putting her girl in the bathtub. The girl almost fell to the ground, if it would not have been for her mother catching her in time. Her bare feet had a hard time finding footing on the slithery bathtub.

"Ooops, we don't want you to fall now. Okay, Ruby arms up."

"Hmm?" The little girl looked up to the woman, her face showing nothing but confusion. Thinking her daughter didn't understand the meaning of her words, possible given her young age, Summer gently took Ruby's arms, pulled them up and then proceeded to take off the little girl's shirt. Ruby was slightly taken aback and let out a short shriek when she suddenly found herself with her upper body naked. She wrapped her tiny arms around herself and shivered from the cold air touching her skin.

"Don't worry, my little rose petal. You'll be warm soon enough. But first, we need to get you out of these clothes."

Next Summer helped her daughter to get out of her trousers, which proved to be quite troublesome because Ruby didn't want to be undressed. The little girl fought back, trying to pull up the trousers to the best of her ability. If Summer would have thought things through, she would have noticed that this was more than an unusual behavior for a two-year-old, not to mention the motorik skills her daughter showed. But the mother just thought her daughter was being silly and after she played along for a little while, she finally managed to undress Ruby completely. The poor girl shuddered from the air touching her skin, with the few teeth she had rattling.

Her mother quickly grabbed the shower head and turned the faucets on. The water immediately began streaming out of the shower head. In order to not accidentally give Ruby the shock of her life, although she had to admit it would be hilarious, Summer checked the water temperature with her hand. When she was satisfied her daughter would neither be frozen or cooked alive, the mother turned her attention back to the tiny girl, who was looking at the shower head in anticipation. Not one to neglect her daughter's wishes, Summer finally began the cleaning process. With the shower head in one hand, the woman used her other hand to go through Ruby's hair, making sure nothing of the sticky liquid would be left behind. The two-year-old giggled during the entire process, her head leaning towards her mother's hand.

After the initial cleaning process, Summer put the shower head down and put some shampoo into her hands. Ruby in the meantime tried to pick up the shower head herself but ended up slipping on the wet bathtub. She let out a shriek, but luckily was caught by her mother, before she could hit the bottom of the tub.

"Ruby, be careful." Her mother chided a little sternly. "There, sit down and let mommy do all the work. She loves to spoil her little rose petal after all." Summer giggled over her own words and started going through her daughter's hair once more. Ruby even "helped" by going through her own hair with her tiny hands, though she actually got more in Summer's way than anything else.

After washing the shampoo out of Ruby's hair, Summer got some more and went on to clean the rest of her daughter's body. Ruby let out a content sigh when her mother slowly rubbed her back. Summer smiled, seeing her daughter enjoying herself. She even let out an adorable "Aaaahh", when Summer took the shower head once more and let the warm water flow over the back of her little girl. When it came to the stomach area however...well, Ruby had always been ticklish. The girl fell on her back and giggled uncontrollably as her mother wasn't even trying to tickle her, but clean her. Summer received quite a lot of water splashes during this time.

R~W~B~Y

In the meantime, downstairs, Yang was slowly munching on a toast her mother made for her. Because of her by comparison small hands, she had to hold a slice with both of her hands, at least if she didn't want to unnecessary dirty her hands. Marmalade was delicious and all, but sticky hands were just a pain.

Raven herself was currently indulged in reading a newspaper, while at the same time she was holding a toast in her right and a coffee mug in her left hand. Her eyes moved so quickly, one would assume she was reading at the pace of a mile a minute. Yang watched her mother reading for a couple of seconds before she refocused her attention on her breakfast. In addition to the food, Raven also prepared some orange juice for her daughter, which Yang took a slight sip from, before slowly continuing with her toast.

"Fools…" Raven muttered under her breath. She put her coffee mug down for a second, in order to get rid of the newspaper from the table and onto an empty chair. She was about to fully focus on her own breakfast when she noticed her daughter's lack of enthusiasm while eating her food. On a normal day, Yang would have already finished her breakfast and would poke her mother with those sticky fingers of hers. This wasn't the case today.

Come to think of it, her daughter had been unusually quiet the entire morning. Normally it only took ten minutes after waking up and the girls could be heard through the entire house. Today was completely different in that regard. Not even Ruby was making much noise upstairs, which was saying something considering the girl almost never closed her mouth.

"Is everything alright Yang?" Raven asked.

Yang in response looked up from her plate, swallowing her food. "H-huh?" was all that came out of the mouth of the confused girl.

"You're awfully quiet today." her mother pointed out. "Is the dream still bothering you?"

Yang didn't answer. She instead ignored her mother's question and continued with her breakfast. Annoyed by the behavior of her daughter, Raven put her hand right next to her daughter's ear and flicked it.

"Ow!" The little girl complained, glaring at her mother, who had a smug smile on her face.

"Don't give me the silent treatment, young lady."

"Why'd you do that?" Yang complained, rubbing her ear.

Raven didn't answer that question. She instead put a hand on her daughter's shoulder and rubbed it gently. "Look, Yang, just tell me if you don't feel good."

"I'm fine." Yang insisted. "Just...a little tired," she admitted, looking away.

The black haired woman frowned and stopped the shoulder rub on her daughter. She instead put some pressure on her daughter's shoulder, not enough to hurt her, but enough to certainly get her attention once again.

"I only want to help you, okay?" Raven told her. "I'm here for you after all."

Yang looked at her mother for a moment, her expression not showing any emotions. Eventually, she looked away again. "It's nothing. Just tired, that's all." And the little girl continued with her breakfast.

Raven frowned, not only because her daughter closed herself off. That alone was unusual in itself. Even more confused were her daughter's words or rather the way she spoke them. There was no energy in her voice, no enthusiasm, no emotion whatsoever. There were just words and nothing more.

If Raven hadn't been convinced before that something was bothering her daughter, she definitely was now. The woman did some brainstorming, thinking about everything that happened these past days and if something might be responsible for her daughter's behavior. But all she came up with was that Yang must have had a nightmare of some sort, everything else didn't make any sense. It should also be mentioned that Raven wasn't the most experienced mother, so it might also be the case that this was something children went through every now and then.

Having narrowed down the possible cause of her daughter's distress, Raven now needed to come up with a solution. Luckily that one was a no-brainer for Raven. Whenever she was stressed out there was only one thing to do: beat up her brother. Okay granted, he wasn't present at the moment. He rarely was, but that could be easily excused due to his semblance. Good thing Raven knew a substitute for the situation.

R~W~B~Y

"Alright, Ruby. Let's get you dressed." Summer announced after she completely dried off her daughter. She picked up said daughter, who immediately snuggled against her mother's chest, and walked out of the bathroom. The red hair could see Raven and Yang sitting on the breakfast table, the latter looking at the former like she had grown a second head.

"Did anything happen?" Summer asked from above. Both Raven and Yang looked up. Little Ruby waved her tiny arm down as if greeting the rest of her family.

"Nope." Raven replied, emphasizing the letter "p" in the word.

"I have just decided that it is time I begin Yang's training." the black haired mother announced.

Summer's eyes widened in surprise for a second, but her expression changed to a scowl. "She's four years old Raven. Four years."

However Raven waved her off. "Relax Sum. I'm not going to leave her in the woods and expect her to fend of Grimm for an entire week until I come and get her."

"Rav…" Summer suppressed a growl, not wanting to scare Ruby. She still showed her disapproval about her partner's sense of humor.

"It's just going to be some simple things, really. Promise. No bones are going to be broken today."

"I hope so for your sake." Summer stated, before heading towards Ruby's room in order to get her daughter dressed. Raven rolled her eyes st Summer's overprotectiveness and returned her attention to her own daughter. "Well, finish up already. Time's a wasting after all." The black haired woman stated, increasing her own pace on how she ate. Yang stared at her mother for a second longer, before finally returning to her breakfast. Occasionally she would glance over to the older woman, who appeared to be fully focused on her task.

By the time the older woman was done, Summer, still carrying Ruby, came downstairs. The two-year-old now wore comfortable black trousers, a red t-shirt, and some white socks. Since Raven didn't need to watch her daughter anymore, she used the opportunity to walk upstairs and get dressed for the day.

Summer once again placed her daughter in the high chair but also had some words for her. "Now don't get yourself dirty again, my little rose petal. Okay?"

"Mhm." Ruby nodded enthusiastically, smiling brightly.

"Good." Summer smiled back. "Now wait here, while I get you your breakfast." The woman turned her attention towards the table and looked for something her daughter might like. In the meantime, Yang was eyeing every one of Summer's movements. The woman, of course, noticed this and turned towards her step-daughter.

"Is there something you want, Yang?" Summer asked with a bright smile.

"N-no." Yang stuttered and looked away. "Nothing."

"Aww, what's wrong? Are you afraid your mother will be too hard on you?" the redhead asked, putting a hand on Yang's arm.

Once again, Yang kept her mouth shut, not sure what to think at this moment or how things came to where they are now in the first place. Almost automatically the girl finished her toast and drank three/fourth of her orange juice in one sip, the exact amount left in her glass.

"Already done?" Summer asked, putting a plate of cereals in front of Ruby. Yang simply nodded.

"Alright. Do you need some help getting dressed?"

"Uh...don't think so?" Yang replied, showing obvious confusion.

"Are you sure? Aw, they grow up so fast." Summer mock-pouted. "Alright. Just call for help if you need any."

"...Alright?" Yang asked/answered.

"Yang?" Ruby spoke up for the first time of the day. "Good luck!" the little girl cheered, bringing a smile on the blond's face.

"Thanks." And with that Yang went upstairs.

Summer smiled down at her daughter, a little surprised as to how effortlessly Ruby managed to speak three words in a row almost perfectly. They grow up so fast indeed.


	3. Chapter 3

When the door to the master bedroom was opened, Summer looked up and found Raven wearing her red huntress outfit, minus the sword. Ruby was preoccupied with trying to get a grip on the spoon her mother left on the plate.

"What exactly is your plan anyway?" Summer asked from downstairs.

"Oh relax already. I'm not my brother, you know?" Raven crossed her arms, looking down at the fellow mother. "It's just going to be some simple and I mean kid-friendly simple exercises. You know, running, throwing and catching balls, make her jump over some hurdles, stuff like this. I'm not going to let her lift weights or something."

"Funny, I actually have no problem imagining you doing this." the redhead smirked.

Raven rolled her eyes. "Oh, laugh it up. Where's Yang anyways?"

"In her room." Summer smiled. "Apparently she thinks she's grown up enough to be able to put on her clothes herself."

The black haired woman let out a sigh. "I'll go and help her. If she made a mess, I'm blaming you."

"She's a child Raven. Children are messy in general, right Ruby?"

Ignoring the last comment, Raven walked over to her daughter's room and opened the door. Once fully opened, she found out that Yang had moved her chair next to the cabinet, in order to reach the sock drawer. Speaking of her daughter, the girl was already dressed in a violet shirt and black trousers. She was rummaging through her drawer with her right arm and cute frown on her face.

"Nope, nope, nope...definitely nope. Nope, nope, nopedy-nope-nope…"

Raven snorted at the display, getting Yang's attention. The girl looked up, supporting herself on the drawer. Once she saw her mom, her eyes went wide for a second. Unfortunately, she managed to shift her weight in a way that she closed the sock drawer and inevitably fell to the ground.

"Uwaaah! OW!"

"Yang!" Her mother exclaimed, running up to her daughter. "Yang, are you alright?" Raven gently took her girl into her arms and turned said girl around. Her daughter was rubbing her forehead with one hand and one of her eyes was closed.

"I'm fine, Mom," Yang grumbled, muttering something under her breath. Raven let out a small sigh in relief.

"You need to be more careful in the future. Else you might accidentally hurt yourself."

"I said I'm fine." the small blonde grumbled, looking to the side. In response, her mother gave her a gentle hit on the forehead with two fingers, which somehow still stung a little bit.

"Hey!"

"Don't talk to me in that tone, young lady. Or else I might consider eating all the strawberry ice cream."

Yang immediately fell silent after the sentence. Raven grinned inwardly and helped her daughter back up to her feet. She inspected the little girl from top to bottom and found out that for a four-year-old, Yang did a pretty good job of dressing herself. The girl in the meantime just stared back at the woman once more, because she all of the sudden reminded her of another woman she had once seen on a train.

The girl was quickly brought out of her train of thought when a bundle of socks landed on her head. It proceeded to roll and fall in front of her face. She managed to catch the thing before it hit the ground.

"Enough daydreaming already. You want to become a strong huntress, don't you?"

"A strong huntress…" the young girl repeated to herself.

Raven ruffled Yang's hair, which earned the woman a glare from the blonde. "I'll wait outside. Don't take too long, little dragon. The Grimm don't wait." With a last gentle pat on the back of Yang's head, the black haired woman left the room and could be heard walking downstairs. The little girl looked at the door for some time, before she walked in front of her mirror. In the reflection, she saw, well herself. A four-year-old Yang Xiao Long.

Her hair was considerably short, her violet eyes scanned the girl in front of her, the arms were short and a little bit on the thin side and the same went for her legs. Her overall body mass appeared to be in a healthy state.

"A strong huntress, huh?" Yang repeated her mother's words. She dropped the socks to the ground and went with the free hand over her arm, rubbing it slowly. Her skin felt a little cool, but the sun shining in from the window already did a great job of warming it up.

"Strong…" The girl closed her eyes, taking in a deep breath with her mouth and slowly letting it out through her nose. "Let's do this," she whispered to herself, pumping her fists together. Her hair glowed for the briefest second, before returning to its normal state.

If her mind was playing tricks on her, she might as well play along. Plus, one could always hope for miracles, right?

XXX

Ruby giggled, having completely on accident hit the front of the spoon so hard that it catapulted into the air and hit Raven's face. Her mother Summer Rose didn't do anything to contain her own laughter. The other mother glared at Summer for a couple of moments, before turning her attention to Ruby.

"Oh oh…" Ruby grinned sheepishly, looking for a way to escape. Unfortunately, she was stuck in her little high chair and her mother didn't look like she was going to help her daughter anytime soon.

Rave leaned down to the two-year-old until her hair completely obscured Ruby's head from the rest of the world. "You're lucky you're so cute, you know that?" The red-clad woman booped her step-daughter on the nose, causing her to involuntarily giggle. Raven let out a "hmph" but smiled nonetheless. "Summer 2.0. Don't wanna imagine how you'll be in a couple of years." Raven muttered to herself and started walking outside.

Summer shook her head, suppressing the last bits of laughter and walked over to her daughter. "Alright, Ruby. Mommy needs to clean up the kitchen, seeing as your father is still on his mission. Don't go anywhere. Mommy is gonna play with you soon."

"Okay, Mommy!"

Summer smiled at her daughter, before attending to the breakfast table once again. Only this time she was cleaning up the table, as well as taking care of the dishes. For the entire time, Summer was working, Ruby watched her like a hawk, tracking her every movement. After five minutes of tidying up the table, Ruby was still watching, which was a little weird, since normally the little redhead demanded to be entertained almost 24/7. Well, the bigger redhead wasn't about to complain about having a little peace and quiet for once.

Around the same time, Yang came walking downstairs. Summer looked in the direction of her step-daughter and spoke: "Do you need any help with your shoes?"

"I'm fine, mom," Yang replied, sounding a little annoyed.

Summer was about to make a reply when her brain registered the words she thought her eardrums received just a few seconds ago. She was about to ask, but already heard the front door opening and closing.

"Must have misheard," she muttered to herself but chuckled at the thought of Yang calling her mother. Technically she was already Yang's step-mother and the same went for Raven with Ruby. She certainly wouldn't mind if Ruby started calling her step-mother, mother.

XXX

Outside Yang found Raven doing pushups in front of the house, oblivious to her daughter approaching.

"Six months cooped up in the house" Raven spoke to herself while doing her push ups "and I'm already out of shape. I need to go out and hunt myself some Grimm! Oh, there you are." Raven looked up but continued with her push-ups. "Mommy needs to train too, you see."

"Mm-hmm." Yang nodded, silently wondering how her mother could speak normally while doing push ups.

"Alright. Mommy needs to finish her own training. How about...you run around the house ten times for a start."

"Sure." Yang nodded enthusiastically. With everything that's been going on, some stress relief sounded really nice right now. She was about to start running when her mother shouted: "Wait!"

"Huh? Why wait?" Yang asked genuinely confused.

"I need to tell you something first. Don't run too fast, Yang. If you do, you'll only get tired. You need to run not too fast, but also not too slow. Did you understand that? Not too fast and not too slow."

Yang resisted the urge to roll her eyes and nodded.

"I know that, mom."

"Do you now?" Raven asked rhetorically. "Well then, show me what you can do. And do take your time. I need to finish those 1000 push ups first."

Yang raised an eyebrow at the comment but shrugged it off. She pretty much decided not to question her own insanity.

"Oh, before I forget, if you get thirsty, there's something to drink to you on the bench."

The four-year-old looked over to the bench, which was placed right next to the entrance of the house. On it sat two water bottles, one presumably belonging to her mother.

"Now then, run along. I'm at 250 push ups already." Raven smirked.

Yang smiled back almost automatically and pumped her fists together. "Alright," she said and started jogging around the house. Raven watched after her daughter until she disappeared behind the first corner of the house. She hoped Yang really understood her explanation and didn't just try to appear smart. She was only four years old after all. Nevertheless, Raven continued with her own training and was pleasantly surprised, when she heard her daughter coming from behind, more so, when she saw that Yang actually was jogging at a slow and steady pace. She even held her arms in the right position, something Raven hadn't even shown her little dragon. Did Summer give her secretly tips from the other side of the house? Perhaps, but this had been an oversight on Raven's part. She was lucky to have such a good partner.

By the time Yang had finished her second round, Raven was already finished with 400 push ups. Maybe she should slow down a bit, considering that children had the rather annoying tendency of having short legs, thus they were pretty slow compared to adults. In fact, by the time her daughter was halfway done, Raven had finished her own personal warm-up exercise. Having nothing better to do, the woman followed her daughter the latter half of the warm-up exercise, just in case, because despite having run for quite some time, Yang had yet to drink a single sip of water. Now, Raven didn't doubt her daughter inherited some strong genes from her mother, but she was still a four-year-old. Yang needed something to drink, immediately. Raven basically pressed the water bottle into Yang's arms, so the little girl wouldn't suffer from dehydration.

"There's no need to go so hard on yourself," Raven explained. "Water is important for you. If you don't drink enough, especially during training, you end up only hurting yourself."

"You mean I become a mummy?" Yang asked with a cheeky grin.

Raven snorted. "I'm not going to wrap you in bandages." The woman shook her head, drinking her own water. "Besides, do you really want to become a mummy?"

"I thought you were my mommy."

"Huh? Well, duh, I...oh…oh…" Raven silently cursed Summer's habit of making bad puns on a regular basis. It appeared as if the other mother already corrupted her step-daughter. "Come on, you little joker. You still have to run some more."

"I'm not a joker. I'm a running gag."

Apparently, Yang's delusions were kind enough to give her the opportunities to make more bad puns, It visibly irritated the illusionist being of her apparent mother slash stranger from the train.

Inside in the meantime, Ruby's mother had provided her daughter with paper and some crayons. The girl had never been much of an artist, but she still did enjoy drawing from time to time, mostly during class and assignments. Unlike the little redhead, Ruby had a clear idea of what was going on. Namely, she hoped that this dream was never, ever going to end.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Tell me, the thing I wrote at the end. Was it too soon?

Ruby hummed a little tune to herself, as she was happily lying on the floor, swinging her legs in the air and working on her so called "masterpiece". In the background, she could hear her mother working in the household. Strangely enough, the noise gave her a kind of reassuring feeling. Probably because it was proof that her mother was still there, not too far away. Just to be sure, Ruby turned her head around. She found Summer, who still had to change out of her nightgown, staring at one of the open cupboards, her silver eyes darting up and down, left and right, seemingly searching for something. Eventually, the woman closed the doors and looked into another cupboard.

Happy that her mother was still there, Ruby returned her attention to her artwork. It was a rather crude picture, depicting two people so far. She wanted to add two more but stumbled upon a little problem. The third person was supposed to wear white clothing, however, she had a white paper in front of her. Thinking quickly, the little girl easily came up with a solution. She would just use the black marker for the outlines and a light blue marker for the clothes. If she did it right, it would certainly look like the person was wearing white clothes. Satisfied with her conclusion, Ruby discarded the red marked and quickly pulled out the black and light blue one out of the box. Eagerly she got back to work, her hand moving quickly in all kinds of direction.

Summer in the meantime was done with her housework and decided that it was overtime that she got into her normal clothes. She glanced outside the window for a moment and saw that Raven had Yang now dodging a bunch of water balloons. The redhead smiled, internally sighing in relief that her partner wasn't throwing sticks or stones. Yang would get wet, sure, but at the same time, it was actually perfect training for a child. The blond would get her training, but it appeared that Raven was smart enough to let it look like it was a game. In a way it was.

Chuckling to herself, Summer turned her attention to her own daughter, who appeared to be lost in her own little world, as she was busy painting her pictures. The mother got closer and took a peak. So far Ruby had made some...lets for two-year-old standards good pictures of people. The first one appeared to be Ruby, a red cape waving in the background and wearing some kind of black outfit. She was placed to the left. The second person, placed to the far right on the paper was undoubtedly Yang, given the blond hair. In the picture, Yang wore some kind of brown outfit and if Summer didn't misinterpret things, the blond was pumping her fists together. Why would Ruby paint her sister like that? It probably was the TV's fault. The shows they ran nowadays were poison for children.

Right at this moment, Ruby was busy painting a third person, who would be standing next to her in the picture. Her mother couldn't make out anything since little Ruby had just begun with the third person's outline.

Seeing as her daughter was busy, Summer thought she could quickly walk upstairs and get changed. After two to three minutes, she came back, now wearing a black, leather outfit with her signature white cloak. Ruby for once wasn't up to any mischief, but still completely absorbed in her work. A little unusual, since children, tended to have a really short attention span, but who knows? Her little girl might end up as an artist one day. Though, Summer would still prefer her being a huntress.

Hearing her mother coming back downstairs, Ruby looked up and waved her arm cheerfully. "Hi, mommy!"

"Hello, sweetie!" Summer waved back and crouched down next to her daughter. "What is my sweet little rose petal drawing?" She could now roughly make out the third person. The lower body was still missing, but it appeared to be a girl with gray, bluish hair. She wore it in a long ponytail. Her clothes had roughly the same color.

"It looks lovely."

"Thank you, mommy," Ruby replied and rubbed her head against her mother's leg.

"Oh my, since when did my little rose turn into a cat?" Summer asked, feigning shock.

Ruby giggled and started meowing. Her mother laughed at her daughter's antics and played along, by slowly stroking the back of the "cat". She then went to crawl Ruby's head at the spot where a cat normally had her ears. To her credit, the little girl was pretty good at imitating a cat, leaning her head upwards and making purring sounds. Summer decided to lie down next to her daughter, which was followed by her rubbing her cheek against her daughter's. Ruby squealed in delight. She wrapped her tiny arms around her mother's neck to the best of her abilities, trying to hang down from it. But she couldn't get a good grip and landed softly on her back, laughing the entire time. Summer smiled down at the girl, wiping some stray strands of hair away from her eyes.

"My little kitty." The woman chuckled, nuzzling her nose against Ruby's, causing the girl to laugh even harder. "Oh, Ruby, my sweet little rose petal." Summer sighed. "If only you'd never grow up."

Ruby titled her head but smiled nonetheless. She grabbed one of her mother's hands and pulled it to her chest. Summer let it happen and simply enjoyed feeling the tiny girl's heartbeat. It was naturally faster than the one of the average adult, yet at the same time reassuring. It was moments like these where Summer truly enjoyed being a mother. Just playing with her child, without a care in the world, as if there wasn't even anything else in existence outside of their little home.

But of course, this wasn't the case, something Summer was all too aware of. She let go of Ruby's chest and helped the girl back into position. The mother got up from the ground, dusting her pants off and stretched herself. "Mmmnngh, I'm getting out of shape. Maybe I should train with you as well." Summer chuckled to herself. "Maybe, when you're older."

"But I wanna train with Mommy now!" Ruby pouted, though it didn't look like she actually meant it. Summer laughed at her daughter's respond. "No Ruby, you're too young."

"Aww." Ruby looked down dejected for a moment, only to look back up a moment later, her smile back in place. "Okay, mommy," she said and returned to her picture. Summer watched her daughter for a little more before she decided to sit down on the couch and pick up a book, which had been lying on the small table placed between the couch and the tv. It was a book with various fairy tales collected from all over the world. Summer read quite regularly stories to Yang and Ruby. She tried to get Raven to read to the kids too. And it worked. Once. Raven mostly complained about the story every one or two lines and even started telling the girls about Team STRQ's shenanigans. The non-child friendly shenanigans mind you. It was then and there decided that Summer would read all of the bedtime stories to the children and Raven could tell her stories when Yang and Ruby were older. Much, much older!

The sudden sounds of multiple crayons hitting the floor, caught Summer's attention. Looking down, she saw that her daughter had emptied the small package in one fell swoop and was now going through every single crayon, seemingly looking for a specific color. Summer shook her head, seeing as she would have to clean up after Ruby once again.

Ruby in the meantime had found the color she had been looking for: black. Summer raised a surprised eyebrow at this, as the color had been rarely used. She looked over the couch and found out that Ruby began painting the fourth person. The third person was done now. It was a girl who wore some kind of skirt and held hands with Ruby.

~Now that's odd.~ Summer thought to herself. ~Why aren't she and Yang holding hands in the picture? Is this girl someone from town? Wait, is Ruby even capable of remembering people she met at random? Who cares? I'm probably just overthinking things. I'm gonna ask her who the other person is, once she's done with the fourth one. In the meantime, Summer decided to turn on the TV, seeing what pitiful things the general population was worrying about now.

XXX

"Argh!" Yang shouted when she was hit with a water balloon once again. This time it landed directly on her head, soaking her hair completely as if it was a sponge. She wondered for the umpteenth time why she was playing along again, as she suppressed a shudder upon a gust of wind hitting her. Her clothes had been soaked some time ago, making it consistently harder to dodge her mother's projectiles. Not to mention the muddy ground, causing Yang to almost slip up a couple of times.

"I think that's enough for now," Raven stated, not even trying to hide the smirk on her face. Yang was sure her eyes turned as red as her mother's a couple of times, but in the end, she simply let her upper body hang for a couple of seconds, in order to catch her breath. The sun was shining down directly on her back, warming the girl up at least a little.

"Not bad," Raven commented approaching her daughter. "You were actually really good. Hmph, I have really gone soft being stuck in this house." The last part Raven said to herself, already making mental plans for future training exercises for herself.

"Gone soft?" Apparently, Yang had heard her.

"Don't worry about it." Raven patted her daughter on the head, before putting a towel over the head. She then proceeded to rub her daughter as dry as possible, at least to the point where water wasn't dripping from her body anymore. When her mother was done, Yang was busy trying to get her hair at least partially back in shape. Raven pretty much make a mess of it, after rubbing it so violently with the towel.

"Now then, are you ready for your next lesson?"

"Can I throw the balloons at you now?" Yang asked in a sarcastic tone.

"Nope." Even Raven seemed to have the family habit of emphasizing the p in the word "nope". She ruffled Yang's hair to which the girl let out a shriek.

"Hey! Stop messing with my hair!" the girl complained, glaring at her mother.

"Or what?" Raven challenged her daughter, messing with her hair once again.

Yang growled, pushing her mother's arm away, as well as taking a few steps back. "I'll punch you into the ocean!" Yang declared, raising her right fist.

Now if Raven would have been a normal mother, she would have been quite worried about the rather violent thread. She would have wondered if it was the TV, some other kid corrupting her daughter, Yang not receiving enough hugs or if some other source was responsible for this behavior.

However, this was Raven. A woman raised among bandits. A woman who believed the strongest should be in charge, who was part of the rather infamous Team STRQ, the woman who shared a husband with her partner. She was actually delighted upon hearing Yang saying those words. It was an indicator that her daughter would become a strong woman one day, that is if Raven nurtured her daughter the right way. And this was exactly what she was going to do.

"Is that so?" Raven asked before she moved. She may have no speed semblance, but trained Huntresses tended to move faster than the human eye could track. As such it was quite easy for her to appear in front of her daughter, pick up a single strand of hair and let it dangling in front of her daughter's eyes.

Yang saw red, literally. Her eyes turned red, her hair started to catch fire and she pumped her fists together, letting out a shout that might as well have been a battle cry. Raven's instincts kicked in, jumping backward. Her eyes were widened in surprise, staring at her daughter's burning form. However, she did not have much time to stare. With seemingly inhuman strength, Yang pushed herself off the ground, sending herself flying at her mother, one fist ready to give her mother the punch of a lifetime. Luckily for the mother, her highly trained flight and fight instincts kicked in and she dodged the attack by jumping sideways.

Since Yang was in mid-air and had no insane hunter weapons equipped, there was no way for the girl to stop. As such her fist collided with a tree and got stuck inside of it.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: There was a question about Weiss and Blake. They'll join in some time, but not as of now. After all, we're technically still on the first day after Ruby's and Yang's "awakening". Don't wanna rush the story, ya know? By the way, I tried to look up for some fitting alcohol puns, but couldn't find any.

There weren't many instances in her life, where Raven was truly stunned to silence. There had been some instances and almost all of them were due to the fault of Summer Rose in some way or other. This time, however, was different.

Her jaw was quite literally hanging from her mouth and her eyes had turned into a pair of plain white dots, as she watched her daughter struggling to get her fist out of the tree. That's right, her daughter, who in a fit of anger somehow turned her hair on fire, who attacked her own mother, yours truly, in said fit of anger, managed to punch through solid wood and as a result had her fist stuck inside the tree.

Of course, this action had resulted in making a lot of noise, enough, in fact, to cause Summer to storm out of the house. "What happened?!" she shouted, stopping next to Raven. "Is Yang o-kay?" Naturally, the redhead's gaze fell rather swiftly upon the scene, which had her partner rendered to silence. And while from an outsider's perspective this scene would be interpreted as extremely funny, especially if one added Yang's cute little grunt noises that came with each time she tried to pull her hand out of the tree, Summer was experiencing a completely different emotion.

The younger mother slowly wrapped an arm around Raven, who was brought out of her stupor by the motion. Ever so gently Summer pulled Raven closer to herself. The older mother felt how her partner gently cupped her chin and turned her head around, resulting in Summer and Raven looking into each other's eyes.

"Raven?" Summer spoke in a sweet, gentle tone.

"Yes, Summer?"

"How is it that Yang's arm is stuck in a tree?"

Now there were very few things in life, which truly scared Raven. As one can imagine, her being a professionally trained and very powerful huntress, those things had to be either insanely strong or insanely dangerous to warrant the woman's fear. Summer Rose fit in both of those categories. One might not guess it, but behind those gentle silver eyes hid a sadistic being, ready to be unleashed upon everything Summer deemed was beyond redemption. People who hurt her family in some way or another were considered beyond redemption.

Raven needed to treat the ground carefully. Her life depended on the next words she spoke. She couldn't let herself be distracted by Ruby, who was rolling beneath the doorframe and laughing like a maniac at her sister's misfortune. Because right now Raven had to suppress a laugh to, the laugh which would lead to her own doom.

"I know what you are thinking Sum-"

"Oh, what exactly am I thinking?" Summer interrupted her partner, still speaking in that sweet, caring tone of hers.

Raven took in a deep breath, steeling her nerves.

"You think I unlocked Yang's aura as a matter to improve her training and coincidentally she unlocked her semblance a couple of minutes ago."

"My Raven, I didn't know you could read minds."

The black haired woman suppressed the deadpan comment that wanted to escape her lips.

"Sum, I did not unlock her aura." the woman said with a straight face. "Neither you nor Tai allowed me to unlock her aura the moment we stepped out of the hospital, although I still argue that would have been beneficial to all parties."

Raven felt the pressure on her chin increasing, as Summer moved her head closer to Raven's. The silver eyes of the Rose appeared to be shining for a moment, although that could have been mistaken for the light of the sun.

"So you didn't unlock Yang's aura as a way to speed up her training? Is that correct?" Summer asked, her smile gone, but her voice still in the same tone.

"Yes, it is." the black haired woman managed to say with a straight face again, although her voice almost faltered for a moment there. Summer continued to stare intently into her partner's eyes, looking for even the slightest hint of deception. When she found nothing of the sorts, she let go of her partner and walked over to her step-daughter. Raven followed suit, rubbing her chin a little. Ruby had already recovered from her laughing fit and was pulling her sister from behind, but it didn't seem to do much. Luckily for both Summer and Raven just knew what to do. The adults placed themselves on each side of Yang and before the girl could even question as to what they were up to, each woman punched the tree, easily tripling the size of the hole.

All of the sudden Yang found it surprisingly easy to pull her fist out, though she was more focused on what Summer and her mother were doing. Raven gave the tree a light push, so it wouldn't fall on them, while Summer was busy inspecting Yang's hand.

"No obvious injuries." Summer said aloud. "But a lot of tree sap. Does it hurt anywhere?"

"Huh? Oh...uh...no." Yang looked down at her very sticky hand. A lot of wooden splinters were glued to it, but as far as she could tell, none of them pierced through her skin. "I'm...fine. I think."

"Are you sure?" Summer pressed on.

"Y-yeah. Pretty much." Yang nodded.

"Hmm…" Summer obviously wasn't convinced by any of those statements.

"Give it a rest, Sum." Raven placed a hand on her daughter's shoulder, pressing it in a reassuring matter. "Her aura must have protected her from any real damage."

Ruby hugged Yang from behind, causing the girl to yelp in surprise. "Yang is really, really strong." the smaller girl declared.

"That she is." Raven agreed with a small grin.

Summer shook her head at the comments of her daughter and her partner. A small smile appeared on her expression nonetheless. The small blond in the meantime felt a little bit left out of the conversation and decided to chime in by asking a question.

"So, what now?" Yang asked, sounding really confused in the ears of the others.

"Well for starters we should get your hand cleaned up." Summer explained, rubbing her hand on the ground since some of the tree sap got onto it. "And then, we're definitely going to see the doctor."

"The doctor?" Yang and Ruby repeated, worry suddenly apparent in their voices.

"Seriously, Sum?" Raven asked with a raised eyebrow. "Aren't you overreacting a little?"

In response, Summer Rose glared at her partner. "I don't know about you, but I have never heard of a four-year-old awakening to her aura on her own. An aura is not a perfect defense and you know this. Yang's bones might have tiny cracks in them from when she hit the tree. Those cracks just might get bigger if she continues to use her hand, which might cripple her for life. Do I need to go on?"

"Alright, alright miss worrywart, jeez." Raven held up her arms, before dropping them again. "I say you're overreacting and that Yang is completely fine, but if it calms your nerves, we can make a quick trip to town and get her checked up."

Raven looked down at her daughter apologetically. "Sorry, little dragon. Looks like training falls short today."

"Aww, too bad," Ruby commented.

"The doctor? But I'm fine, really." Yang insisted, not really seeing the reason as to why her lunatic brain would make her go to the doctor with her family. But then again, she was crazy, so wasn't it logical that her mind would come up with seemingly random or illogical things? She just hurt herself with that thought process.

"I just want to make sure you're all a-okay." Summer told her step-daughter, smiling down at her. "Sometimes it looks like everything is fine, but it is not."

"Huh?" Yang titled her head. "What do you mean?"

"Don't confuse her more than necessary." Raven laughed. "Tell you what. We head over to the doc and if it turns out everything is fine, you'll buy her as much ice cream as she wants."

"Ice-cream?" Yang asked confused.

"YAY! Ice-cream!" Ruby jumped around Yang until she was right in front of her sister. "Yang, will you get me some ice cream?"

"Rubes, I only meant that for Yang."

"Yeah!" Ruby nodded enthusiastically. "Yang will get me ice cream!" The little redhead declared, pointing at her sister, who was looking back and forth between Ruby and her mother.

"I'll get you ice-cream?" Yang asked.

"Uh huh. Mommy gives you ice-cream." Ruby explained, pointing first at Summer Rose and then at Yang. "You will give me ice cream!" She pointed from Yang to herself. "Then mommy gives you more ice cream! I get more ice cream!"

"Ah." Yang nodded, understanding what her sister meant. "But why should I give you my ice cream?" Yang asked with a smirk on her face. Her smirk soon vanished, when she found her sister looking triumphantly over to the blond.

"Because" Ruby declared, taking in a deep breath "pretty pweeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaase?" she pleaded, giving Yang the most dreadful weapon the two-year-old had in her arsenal. Her puppy dog eyes.

Summer and Raven, who had been watching the entire exchanged took a couple of seconds before they managed to process as to what had transpired in front of them. By this time Yang had already given in, nodding to her sister numbly. Ruby squealed, hugging her sister and saying "thank you, thank you, thank you" over and over again. Raven face-palmed.

"Sum, you sure your daughter isn't possessed by a Grimm or something?"

"...Uh...I blame the internet?"

XXX

Around an hour later, Summer, Raven and their daughters were inside the house of Patch's doctor. Doctor White, Plain White if you want his full name, was the best-equipped doctor on the island, only to be beaten by the official hospitals of the four Kingdoms. Best equipped meant he naturally had an x-ray installed inside his house, inside a specially isolated room. Ruby and Yang busied themselves playing a children's card game. They probably weren't really following the rules, but their parents were too occupied in a discussion to care at the moment. As long as both of them weren't trying to kill each other, the kids could do their thing.

"Too much? Oh please, it's gonna be literal child's play for Yang."

"The concept is not the problem." Summer told her partner. "It's just, she'll barely have any time for herself or her friends."

"Oh please." Raven rolled her eyes. "She'll attend grade school in two years. She'll spend plenty of time with other kids during that time."

"School isn't the same, Rav." the other mother retorted. "The two of us also didn't become friends, just by sitting in class and hunting Grimm. I have nothing against you training her. I'll even train her with you if only to keep you from breaking her bones."

"What was that?"

"You heard me." Summer deadpanned. "If it would go your way, you'd just drop her in the forest in the middle of the night and come back about a week later to see if she was still alive."

"I was actually thinking more along the lines of dropping her off a cliff." Raven joked, earning her a scowl from her partner.

"That's not funny, Rav."

"Your puns are not funny."

"Come now, you know they're pun-tastic."

"Urgh, they're as bad the stuff Qrow keeps drinking."

"You're such a booze-kill."

"Now, you're not even trying."

Luckily for Raven, she was saved from any more horrible puns coming from her partner, as the doctor came down from upstairs, with tablet-scroll in his hand.

"Well, I have thoroughly analyzed the pictures," he turned his tablet around, allowing the two mothers to see the small, skeletal shape of Yang's hand. Yang and Ruby were looking at it as well, their card game completely forgotten.

"I'm happy to say that your daughter's hand is unharmed. As far as I can tell, she recently awakened aura has protected her from the sudden impact you described."

"Told you," Raven said in smug satisfaction.

"Yay! That means ice cream!" Ruby cheered, already making a mental list of flavors she wanted.

Ignoring the two, Summer asked a question that had been plaguing her mind from the beginning.

"What about her aura in itself? Will it affect her growth in any way? I have never heard of a person so young awakening her aura."

"Well, in that regard I can assure you, nothing will happen. There have been recorded precedent cases of four-year-olds awakening to their aura, usually through some kind of emotional trauma." the doctor explained.

"She did have a nightmare," Raven stated, looking down at her daughter.

"Hmm, depending on how realistic the nightmare appeared to be to Yang, it might have been enough to trigger it." the doctor nodded thoughtfully. "As for her semblance awakening at the same time, as far as I am aware, little Miss Xiao-Long is a first. But it is still within the realm of possibility and shouldn't have any impact on her life unless of course, it is something she'll need to learn to control. But that's something you two will have to assert for yourself. I'm not a professionally trained hunter, after all. I just know how to keep you intact." the man chuckled a little.

"Thank you, doctor. Is there anything else we need to know?" Summer asked.

"Ah, yes. I don't have the equipment or expertise to estimate her aura level. I suggest you Miss Branwen do this as soon as your daughter fully recovers her aura, which should be around tomorrow."

"That I'll do." Raven nodded. "Given that she managed to punch through a tree, I'll bet she'll set a new record." the woman said confidently.

"Okay then. I hopefully will only have to see you for your regular check-ups then. And of course, something sweet for the two sweeties." The doctor pulled two lollipops out of his pocket and handed them over to Yang and Ruby. Both girls smiled brightly and said: "Thank you!" at the exact same time. Not a second later, Ruby had her loli inside her mouth and was happily sucking on it, making slurping noises. Yang was a little more restrained in that regard.

Summer and Raven shook the doctor's hand.

"Thank you for your time doctor."

"Anytime Miss Rose. Miss Branwen."

"Keep yourself in one piece, doc. You're one of the phew useful people on this rock."

"Raven!"

"Just stating the obvious."

XXX

Summer mentally cried over her rather empty wallet. It wasn't even Yang who demanded that much ice cream. It was Ruby who gave Yang the puppy dog eyes and then Yang who gave them to Summer and well...if you're ever caught in the unfortunate situation, where Summer Rose wants to kill you, just hide yourself behind a child. She could never resist those.

"What do you think Yang's semblance is?" Raven mused, rather enjoying her partner's misery.

Summer was brought out of her thoughts and gave the question some serious thought. "Well, it obviously has to do something with her strength. Not sure, though, since I haven't seen it. Could you describe it one more time?"

Raven nodded, taking a sip from her coffee. "I teased her bit about her hair,-"

"You cut my hair!" Yang shouted, her eyes turning red for a second.

Summer and Raven looked at her for a second, the latter one with a little bit of amusement. Ruby ignored it, being used to these kinds of outbursts for a long time. "Oh, don't worry about it." Raven ruffled her daughter's hair, who tried to avoid contact and failed.

"Anyways, she got angry, pumped her fists together and was suddenly on fire. Hmm, that might actually be it."

"Her anger?" Summer asked, looking over to her step-daughter, who kept her eyes on her mother, while slowly eating her ice cream. Carefully Summer reached out to her daughter until she was only a few centimeters away from the blond. She hesitated for a second before she took a bushel of hair and gently, very gently pulled it. Immediately, Yang turned her head around, glaring at Summer. At the same time, her hair caught fire, causing the redhead to let go. At the same time, her eyes turned red and her ice melted in her bowl.

"Mom" Ruby spoke up all of the sudden "do we have any marshmallows?"

Raven howled with laughter.


	6. Chapter 6

Ruby clumsily held her arms up, allowing her mother to take the t-shirt of the girl and replace it with the top piece of Ruby's pajamas, making the change in clothes complete. Summer then proceeded to boop her daughter on the nose, causing the girl to squealed and covered her face.

"Alright Ruby," Summer announced, picking the girl up with her arms. "Time to go to bed." Summer readjusted her daughter in her arms, in order to safely carry her to bed. However, as it was usual for children, Ruby didn't want to go to bed just yet. The girl struggled in her mother's grip, thrashing and shouting like a Nevermore trapped in a birdcage. This was pretty much standard routine for the mother and after everything that had happened on this particular day. Yang awakening her semblance, Ruby having extraordinaire speaking abilities and last but not least a black hole appearing inside Summer's wallet, sucking out almost all of the money she'd been carrying with her. Luckily Ruby had yet to comprehend the concept of bank accounts or else things would have looked grim.

Smiling at her mental half-pun, Summer gently forced her daughter into bed, who still tried to wiggle herself free from her mother's grasp. The adult simply held her daughter in place, while tucking her in with just one arm. Of course, Ruby's constant movement didn't make this task any easier. The girl kept on messing up the blanket, undoing her mother's work in a matter of seconds. But Summer Rose knew better. Her daughter would run out of stamina rather sooner than later. She just needed to have a little patience.

And in fact, it didn't take long for the little girl to stop struggling. The only thing she could do afterward was to hold weakly onto her mother's fingers with her own tiny hands. Summer smiled and gave Ruby a soft kiss on the head, before finally tucking her daughter properly in. After she had made sure that her daughter was comfortable, Summer got up from the bed. Her daughter lets out a cute little whine, which caused the mother to look back down on her daughter.

"Oh, don't worry Ruby." Summer bent back down and gave her daughter another kiss on her forehead. "Mommy hasn't forgotten about your bedtime story." The woman stood back up. "I just need to get your story books." She explained, already wandering through the room to the shelf, where she normally left Ruby's books. She quickly skimmed through the selection, wondering which one she should read to her daughter. She stopped skimming, when her gaze fell onto a particular cover, picturing four beautiful women in equally beautiful dresses. The Legend of the four Maidens. It was a birthday present from Raven of all people, who wasn't exactly a fan of fairy tales or cartoons (except the adult ones). The black-haired woman at the time simply stated: "I couldn't find anything better." Translation: "Your girl is too young to handle super, awesome, explosive weapons and I didn't want to have unnecessary feelings of guilt." A typical Raven statement.

Nevertheless, Summer found it had been a sweet gesture from Raven at the time. And since she had been staring at the cover for a solid minute, Summer decided she might as well read it to her daughter. Spinning around, she casually approached her daughter's bed, who looked up to the adult with ever-curious eyes. The mother climbed into her daughter's way too small bed, her feet dangling over the railing. The woman carefully wrapped an arm around her daughter, so that she could hold the book in a way that both mother and daughter could look into it. Ruby may not be able to read, but she always enjoyed the pictures.

With the two silver-eyed humans set in cuddle position, Summer opened the book and began reading.

"This is the Legend of the four Maidens…"

XXX

Raven in the meantime, was already done tucking her daughter into bed. The little blonde apparently had already been exhausted and didn't make much of a fuss, the only exception being her insistence of brushing her own teeth, something Raven would have approved of, if it wouldn't have been for Summer's presence and Raven was never really in the mood for another lecture on how to be a proper mother. Heck, back when she was so young, she didn't even know what a toothbrush was.

Right now, the huntress was flipping through the channels, waiting for her partner to be done with the bedtime story. Raven eventually settled to the news channels, because for some reason nothing interesting appeared to be running on TV. Heck, even the news weren't at least in the slightest interesting. Something about the newest Schnee girl accidentally drenching her father in wine. Okay, wait, that one was actually at least a little funny. Apparently, the Schnee guy was up to some of his usually PR by showing up at some wine tasting in Atlas. His four-year-old daughter then somehow managed to get a hold of an already opened bottle, but because of her clumsiness she couldn't hold it for too long and dropped it right on her father's lap. For the record, the girl for some reason thought it was a good idea to climb onto the table. How she did it, no one knows. For some reason, no one bothered paying attention to the little girl, as such the cameras only caught the white dressed Schnee walking in front of the cameras, already standing on the table. Her father had been looking the other way at the time and for some reason, no one bothered to get the girl off the table, least she fell to the ground. By the time the father noticed what his daughter was up to, it was too late. Raven allowed herself to chuckle, as she saw the entire scene unfold. The girl picking up a bottle, a wine glass right in front of her. She somehow manages to carry a huge bottle (in comparison to her own height) for a few seconds, before losing balance and falling forward. Just in time, her father happened to turn around and some very expensive clothes just got ruined.

A nice little tidbit, which was soon replaced with other news from the so called high society. Seeing this, Raven turned off the TV completely. Instead, the huntress picked up a magazine from the small table in front of her and began skimming through the pages.

"45 caliber dust rounds, twenty percent off…" Raven read aloud. "Might be worth the purchase…" Of course, back in the day, she would have simply robbed the entire shop. Or maybe not, as it would have drawn too much attention. Instead, she most likely would have raided an entire village, which not only would have given her the rounds, but also a lot of other supplies. However, the days of raiding villages and killing the weak were over. And so far it didn't look like those days would come back anytime soon.

Raven sighed in frustration. Reminiscing about the past was a bad habit of hers, whenever she was alone and got nothing to do. She just hoped that Summer would come down soon so that they could discuss Yang's lesson plan for the following days. The blonde's mother already had several things in mind on how to properly train her daughter, some of which may or may not include her brother ending up as a punching bag.

Alas, those thoughts were put on hold, when Summer finally decided to come downstairs. She had her hood down and her hair looked a little messy.

"Ruby didn't really want to go to sleep tonight. She demanded some extra cuddles, along with the bedtime story." The silver eyed woman giggled.

"You're spoiling the kid too much, Sum." Raven scoffed half-heartedly.

"And you're such a spoilsport sometimes, Rav." From behind the couch, Summer wrapped her arms around her partner and placed chin on Raven's head. "You need to loosen up some more."

"Loosen up?" Raven repeated. "I think you have softened up way too much. We need to get you back to combat Sum, rather sooner than later." The black haired woman leaned backward with her arm and began to slowly stroke with her fingers through Summer's hair. The woman leaned into the touch as if she was a real pet.

"Mmm, yeah. Maybe. I've been out of practice for a while. Maybe some Beowulf hunting will do me some good. Getting rid of the Grimm on the entire island should be enough of a warm up."

"Yup." The black haired huntress agreed, continuing with the stroking. "And after that, we'll clean out the Emerald Forest."

"Hmm...but where are the hunter cadets supposed to get weak Grimm to train with?" Summer argued.

"Tch, it's not like there's gonna be a shortage of Grimm anytime soon." Raven pointed out. "Even if we somehow manage to secure the island, I'm pretty sure that those things will somehow make it back here, even if it is by riding on the back of an aquatic Grimm."

Summer couldn't help but giggle at the mental image of a Whale Grimm, carrying a bunch of Beowulfs on it's back, bringing them from one island to another.

"It actually would explain how they got here in the first place, not counting the flying Grimm."

"Doesn't matter how they got here," Raven said offhandedly. "What matters is that we find out how to get rid of them permanently." ~Them and their leader.~ The swordfighter added mentally.

Summer let out a tired sigh. "A world without the fear of Grimm. It'll be hard to keep count if we go through with this, you know?" The woman smirked. Raven turned her head slightly, allowing her partner to see her own smirk.

"Why keep count? We both know that I'm the better huntress."

"Really? I think there are some people who would disagree with you."

Summer decided that the position she was in was no longer comfortable. The silver eyed huntress let go of her partner and walked around the couch, so she could sit down right next to the other woman.

"Who, Tai? Qrow? The only reason they don't admit that I am superior to you is because they think as the de facto leader, you're strongest of the four of us. That and they'll do anything for you to cook something for them."

"Well, as the saying goes: Love goes through the stomach." Summer giggled.

"Wisecrack," Raven muttered to herself. "Food won't save you from the Grimm unless you poison them. Come to think of it, did we ever try to kill Grimm with poison?" Raven asked with real curiosity. Her partner considered the question and mentally made a list.

~Let's see….we slashed, shot them, crushed them with a rock, dropped a bullhead on them, explosions, ice, electricity, all that good stuff. What else did we use? Ah yeah, spears, trap holes with spikes, the 4:10 train from Vale to Uma, threw 'em into an active volcano once, drowned some others in the ocean, collapsed a building on top of an entire pack of beowulfs, build a catapult at the end of our third semester, flattened them by detonating a box of gravity dust….~

"Uhmm, nope. Don't think so." Summer shrugged. "Want to try it out?"

"Hmmm, no. I've never really seen Grimm eating anything, have you?"

"Nope. Do they just eat each other or something?"

"They're attracted to negative emotions." Raven contemplated, putting a hand under her chin. "Given that they are soulless creatures and never leave anything solid behind when they die, they might live from those emotions. Maybe it's also what gives birth to them, in which case it'll be impossible to get rid of them completely."

"Of course there's a way. I'll just have to broadcast my stand-up comedy act across the entire world and the Grimm will die from starvation because everyone will be laughing their asses off."

~I'm pretty sure Salem will appreciate you helping her out with her plans for world domination.~ Raven thought to herself. ~Congratulations Salem. All of your careful planning, all of your scheming was for nothing. Because this woman here can bring the world to despair in less than half an hour.~


	7. Chapter 7

Yang wasn't sure what woke her up. Her arm or what was left of it anyways didn't hurt for once, so it couldn't have been that. Plus this was the first night in a while, where she didn't relive the moment of actually losing it, in whatever bizarre way her subconsciousness could imagine it. In fact, she had actually a pretty nice dream, which left a bittersweet aftertaste now that it had ended. But she learned the hard way that all good things end at some point or other.

The louvers were still down, but through tiny cracks in between, the blonde could see that dawn had arrived on Patch Island. Figuring that since she actually didn't feel like staying in bed for once, she might be able to prepare breakfast for her dad, since he had taken care of her for so long already. At least that should still be possible, even in her crippled state.

Throwing the blankets off with one hand, she searched for the hairband on her dresser with the other one, but-

Yang Xiao Long stopped dead in her tracks, as soon as her caffeine lacking brain processed the information it was getting through its nervous system. One hand, that being the left one, touched the blanket. Nothing unusual there. However, in the meantime, the right hand, the supposed not to be there hand, was touching the wooden surface of her nightstand.

Adrenaline rushing through her body, Yang slammed her somewhat too small fist on the switch of the lamp standing on the nightstand. After being blinded for a moment, the girl was capable of examining her own body and froze in shock.

First off her chest, which she was rather proud of, was gone. Secondly, her hair was short. As in way too short for her liking. And thirdly, her entire body seemed to have shrunk so far that she had the height of a four-year-old.

Yang never claimed to be the smartest cookie in the batch, but she was far from dumb. Reckless yes, but not dumb. This was simply putting two and two together. The supposed "dream" she had the other day, her mom and her actual mom being there (guess who's who), a toddler little sister, not to mention the comparable crazy day she spent with everyone: it all happened. It all actually freaking happened!

The again four-year-old was torn between crying tears of joy and tearing her hair out, due to the sheer confusion. Who could blame her? This was literally a dream come true! It was too fucking good to be true! There had to be a catch somewhere, right?

Maybe she was right from the very get to go! Maybe she lost it, her mind having shut down and retreating into a perfect world, in order to further protect the blonde from Grief. But no, that couldn't be it. Somehow Yang just knew that this was not some kind of delusion. Everything was just too detailed for a dream or delusion, everything felt too real. But normally delusional people claim not to be delusional, even though they are? Maybe delusions are different from normal dreams. Maybe it was supposed to feel this real. Yet at the same time, delusional people never think they are delusional!

At this point, one could see smoke coming out of Yang's ears from the brain overworking itself. She fell back on her pillow, groaning from both a headache and her being overall clueless as to what was going on. She was at least 100% sure that the eighteen years she had lived so far had been indeed real. There, point. No overthinking things!

Now was the time to figure out what was going on. She needed the where, when, who, but most importantly the how. How was this all possible? Semblance? No way in hell. Anyone who had some kind of time travel semblance would rule the world by now. Time machine? Same thing and pretty much impossible to build.

And Yang was out of options already. She was confused, she was hungry and her body began to feel uncomfortably cold too. Since only one of those problems could be addressed, the girl pulled the covers back up and snuggled back into them, shivering a little, as her body got heated up once more. It also had the beneficial side effect of calming the agitated girl down. Adding to this the fact that her adrenaline was leaving her body, plus the hunger and slight mental exhaustion caused Yang to fall back into a light sleep relatively soon.

XXX

Ruby wasn't sure what to think of this. For a total of ten minutes had she been standing in front of her mirror and for a total of ten minutes had she been at a loss. Was she dreaming? Was this real? Was she dead? Was this magic? Was this the work of the matrix? Hey, she always kept an open mind.

Regardless of what scenarios she came up with, none of them (except a wish upon a shooting star) could really explain what was happening. She could clearly remember what happened the other day. The entire day over had she imagined that everything was just a dream. Now she knew better. Or at least she thought she did, she wasn't 100% sure.

The longer she stood there, the harder it got thinking of a possible explanation. Her tummy started rumbling too, which made it even harder for her to come up with anything. To add insult to injury, she couldn't even open her own door, because of how short she was. Wait. Didn't she and Yang actually share a bedroom? Of course, they did! Not that she was ungrateful for having her own space, but still this was another oddity to add to the ever-growing list of oddities.

Ruby shook her head. She had to focus on what was important right now! Namely getting her tummy filled with sweet, delicious cookies, in order to increase the efficiency of her brain by 100%. She was a fighter! She would overcome such a small challenge as opening a big door. And she already knew how.

Confidently she turned around and walk to the direction of her chair. Two steps later she stumbled and landed on her forehead.

"Owie~..."

This was another thing going on. She couldn't walk properly for a long period of time. In fact standing alone proved to be a difficult task in of itself, which she was only able to pull off thanks to her huntress training.

Slowly but surely, Ruby pressed herself off the ground and back to her own two feet. It was just a setback. With a cute, high pitched "humph", she once again started her journey towards her chair! She fell again. But hey, at least she managed to cover more ground this time.

Two more attempts later she reached her destination, but her forehead had a big bump growing out like a unicorn's horn. Yet her hard labor already bore the fruits of…

"Nooooooo!"

Apparently Ruby just realized that her chair, which had been sized down for children, was way too small. Even if she stood on her toes, she would never be able to reach the door handle. Not to mention she would have to push the chair to the other end of the room, but she was confident enough in her abilities that she at least could do that. But it would be a fruitless effort, as she already realized. The only thing left for her to do was to drop her head in shame and leave the battlefield, go back to her bed and wait for Mommy to-

That's when it hit her like an Ursa Major.

Her mother was alive.

Yang's mother was actually here!

Yang had both arms!

The implicated relationship the two mothers had with Yang's and Ruby's shared father was...disturbing, to say the least.

But hey, Summer Rose was alive and well!

Who cared about the details? Who cared about the who, when, where and how?! Why should she care? Here was her chance to live a perfectly normal life, become an even better Huntress and prevent all the bad stuff from happening! She could later figure out what was going on. It was probably the work of a good fairy anyways and according to her story books, they tended to keep themselves hidden from the eyes of Faunus and Humans while doing their magic. Ruby made a mental note to bring them some milk and cookies the next opportunity she had, less the fairies would think she was ungrateful and they would start pulling their infamous pranks on her. Like that one time, when they cursed her sister with the ability of bad puns, making Ruby's life thoroughly miserable.

XXX

Raven's hand smashed another alarm clock to pieces before it could blare on for any longer. Summer stirred a little at the sudden noise, but else remained asleep for today. Raven really envied her partner right now. She made a mental note to force Taiyang to prepare breakfast for the next two weeks after he was back. For such a simple mission, the man was seriously taking his sweet time.

Raven looked down at the woman she somehow managed to put herself on overnight. Summer had her arms tightly wrapped around the other woman. If Raven didn't know better, she would say her partner was doing this on purpose. Pulling a little prank in the morning, just to tease the other woman a little bit.

But this was not the case and Raven didn't want to wake her partner up. Luckily, she knew a little trick, which only worked when Summer was fast asleep. Raven simply gave Summer a soft kiss on the lips. The response was almost immediate. Subconsciously Summer relaxed, her grip loosening a little, but not completely going away. The black haired woman simply moved her head next to Summer's ear and whispered: "Let go." And Summer Rose did as she was told.

Now free from her partner's clutches, Raven got off her partner, but not without giving her a final kiss on the forehead. Afterward, she got up, made sure her partner was all tuckered in and walked out of the bedroom to prepare breakfast.

"I've become a real softy." she mumbled to herself disapprovingly, yet couldn't hold off the smile.


	8. Chapter 8

Taiyang Xiao Long did his best to ignore the stares he got from his fellow townsfolk. He could hardly blame them for staring, after all, he got pretty beaten up during the mission. His arms and legs were covered in bandages, he wore a temporary eyepatch on his right eye. A particular nasty Grimm had spit some kind of acid or poison (he didn't really pay attention to the doctors, as he had been high from the pain killers) in this particular eye and after the treatment, he simply needed to wait it out, until it was healed again. Aside from that, his clothes got ragged by the Grimm, his shoes had seen better days and the back of his left hand had suffered a second-degree burn. All in all, a typical mission for Team STRQ, only this one he had carried out solo.

It would probably have been a good idea to stay at the hospital, but really, he didn't want to worry his family for any longer than necessary. Calling might have been a good idea, but Tai had been too out of it after the mission to think of that and now was out of the question. His scroll had no energy left.

"Tai!" one of the townspeople, a local shopkeeper exclaimed and immediately ran up to the Huntsman. "What happened to you?! Are you hurt? Should I bring you to the doctor."

"Easy there, Derrek." Tai held up a hand and gave the other man a weak smile. "I already got patched up. Mission went a little haywire, 'because of a Nevermore migration."

"Oh, dust." Derrek held a hand in front of his mouth in shock.

"Oh, chill out. The Nevermores are no more and I still came out on top. Got a few scratches here and there, but eh, happens."

"A few scratches?!" the shopkeeper exclaimed. "What happened to your eye?"

"Not much." the blond shrugged. "Just needs to heal up a bit, before I can use it again. Guess I'm gonna play pirates with the girls the coming days."

"...If you say so." Derrek the shopkeeper didn't sound so sure. "Just don't overdo it, you know? You're one of the few huntsmen we have on our little rock here. It'd be a shame to lose you, you know?"

"Hah. So it wouldn't be a shame if there were more?"

"Th-that's not what I meant!" the shopkeeper vehemently waved his arms in front of Taiyang.

"Hahaha. Just messing with ya, man. Well, I'd love to stay and chat, but I really wanna hit the couch right now and I'm pretty sure Raven is gonna give me an earful for not calling the past days."

"Uh...alright. Just… are you sure you can make it on your own."

Tai stretched his arms, yawning a little. "Yup, no problem. See ya around."

XXX

After twenty minutes of grunting and grumbling, his house finally came into view. The blond man let out a deep sigh of relief. His legs and arms were aching, he was hungry, exhausted and about to collapse on the spot. However, seeing his home gave the family father new energy, which allowed him to slouch up to the front door. After fishing the keys out of his pocket, he attempted to open the door, but accidentally hit the wood, instead of inserting the key into the keyhole. This happened two more times, as his eye-hand coordination suffered from only being able to see with one eye.

Finally, on the fifth attempt, he managed to insert the key and open the damn door. As soon as he did so, the smell of coffee and toast entered his nose. After eating nothing more but rations and whatever he could hunt for a week, Tai's mouth immediately began to water. Almost like an automaton, the man entered his home, closed the door rather loudly, hung the key on its place at the wall, turned around and was greeted by a red blade held against his throat. He had been so tired, the cold steel cut through whatever aura he had regenerated right off before he managed to stop himself.

Raven stood in front of him, still wearing her usual nightgown and looking none too pleased.

"You're late." she stated as a matter of fact.

"Why hello to you too," Tai replied in a sarcastic tone. "Is that a way to greet a hunter, after he returned from his glorious mission as a savior of mankind?"

Raven snorted. "Funny what you understand as glorious. You look like absolute shit."

"Thank you, you look sexy too."

"I always do." Raven lowered the blade, allowing Tai to rub his neck. With satisfaction, he noticed that his skin hadn't been cut in any way. His aura managed to absorb the damage, if barely. The woman in front of him sheathed the blade and took the weapon with her into the kitchen. Taiyang followed her, shaking his head. Arriving in the kitchen, he found that everything had already been prepared to have a breakfast with the entire family. Only the family was missing.

He took the next best seat he could grab. Raven already poured him a cup of coffee and handed it over to the man, which he graciously accepted.

"Thanks." He immediately emptied the cup in one huge sip, before slamming it on the table. With the hot liquid filling up his stomach, the man leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms. "Much better." he sighed in satisfaction.

"What took you so long?" Raven asked, taking a seat on the other side of the table.

"Jeez, at least let me arrive, will ya?" Taiyang leaned forward. "To make a long story short, somebody failed to notice the huge Nevermore migration coming into the area. So not only did I have to deal with some overgrown wolves and bears, nope! The chickens wanted to have some fun too. Took me a while to take them all out."

"I see." Raven put a hand under her chin, thinking. "Nevermores, huh? An entire flock of them is hard to overlook. What kind of idiot did they hire to scout the area?"

"An idiot, obviously. Though it just might have been bad luck on my part. It was pretty clouded the past two weeks and at one point there was even a storm. But let's forget about that." Tai grabbed himself some bread and started to make himself a sandwich. "What's been going on here? Still enjoying live as a housewife?" The tone of Taiyang's voice shifted into the teasing category. Raven ignored it.

"I do my part, just like you, Summer and Qrow do," she stated as a matter of factly. "But I think I'll take on the next job. I'm starting to feel rather...restrained I guess is the best word."

"Haha, to be honest, I'm surprised you didn't already crack. You know, you're not the person who likes to sit around idly and watch her child play in the living room or something."

Raven huffed, crossing her arms. "Hmph, Summer thinks the opposite is the case. And to be honest, I'm not sure how I'm holding up myself. But I do know that I need some action sooner rather than later."

"Mhm." Taiyang only nodded, having his mouth stuffed with bread. He stopped in the middle of the chewing motion when his hurt eye suddenly began to sting. Swallowing his food quickly, Tai gently rubbed around his hurt eye, trying to somewhat alleviate the pain. He had partial success.

"Eye twitching?" Raven asked.

"Funny," Tai replied, not really meaning it.

"What happened?"

"Now you ask?" the man let out a small sigh. "Grimm got me good there. The eye is fine, more or less, but I won't be able to see anything with it for a couple of days or weeks. The doctors couldn't give me an exact estimate."

"Hmm." Raven poured herself another cup of coffee, while she listened to her teammate.

"Could be worse. Guess I'm gonna play pirates with the girls for the upcoming days." The man laughed, but stopped, when his arms started to hurt. He flinched a little and tried not to move them too much. "Ow…" he groaned.

"You alright?" the woman asked.

"I'll be fine. Just need some actual sleep and fully recover my aura," he explained. "And definitely some good food." The blond shoved an entire untoasted toast into his mouth and swallowed it without doing much of the chewing. He followed that up with some cheese and spoonful of peanut butter.

"You know, you don't have to eat like back at our academy days." The raven haired and samely named woman pointed out.

"Sorry." Tai held a hand in front of his mouth, in order to prevent crumbs from falling onto the floor. "Just haven't had something good to eat for days."

"I wouldn't exactly call cheese and peanut butter a "good" combination. Especially the way you devoured it all." Raven spoke with a raised eyebrow. She glanced over at a nearby clock and sighed when she saw the time.

"It's time to wake up the kids." She stood up and headed for the stairs. "If you collapse, make sure you don't bleed too much. I don't want you to traumatize the children."

"Thanks for your concern. Seriously, would it hurt her to at least pretend we get along?!" The man shouted after the woman, but she completely ignored him. Letting out yet another sigh, Tai got up from the chair and dragged himself into the living room, because he really needed to lay down right now and the couch didn't appear to be such a bad idea.

Raven in the meantime entered her daughter's bedroom not so silently. She found her blonde child still asleep under her covers. The black haired mother shook her head, feeling a little bit of jealousy rising up in her chest. She wished she could sleep as peaceful as her daughter, ignorant of the evil forces trying to destroy humanity. But that was a pipe dream. After everything Raven had seen, she knew she had to sleep with an eye open, until she killed Salem.

With that in mind, Raven opened the blinds to Yang's window, causing sunlight to fall on her daughter's face. Yang in response groaned, shielding her eyes with her small hand.

"Well, look who's finally awake."

Yang opened her eyes upon hearing her mother's voice, blinking a couple of times in order to adjust them to the light. Raven chuckled a little upon the display and walked over to her daughter, placing herself on the bed. Yang leaned herself upwards in order to get a better look at her mother's face.

"Did you sleep well?" Raven asked, going with her hands through her daughter's hair. The blonde girl flinched, but else didn't fight back, still too tired to do so.

"Mmph."

Raven interpreted this as a muffled and slightly tired "yes". She smiled, as she slowly went with her hand through Yang's hair, who subconsciously leaned into it. She probably would have fallen asleep again, if her mother didn't remove the covers from Yang's body, causing her to fully wake up, due to the cold air hitting said body.

"Gah!" she exclaimed, glaring at the woman in front of her. Raven just smiled cheekily and forced her daughter to stand up. "Come on, it's time for breakfast. I have to wake up your sister too, so let's get you dressed."

"I can do it myself," Yang grumbled back, surprising Raven ever so slightly. From the looks of things her daughter already wanted to become a little more independent than most children. At least Raven thought so, she wasn't sure, as growing up in the tribe forced her to become independent herself at a fairly early age. Maybe it was the genes.

"Alright." Raven acknowledged, standing up. "But if you're not done in fifteen minutes, I might just eat all of the strawberry jam."

"Hey!" Yang exclaimed, puffing her cheek. Raven laughed and gave her daughter a wink, before exiting the room and heading for Ruby's room. Summer's daughter was in a similar state to how Raven had found Yang. The black haired woman used the same tactic to wake up the Rose like she had done with her own Dragon. It worked flawlessly.

Ruby groaned and rubbed her eyes with her tiny hands, looking around her room a little confused, until her gaze fell on Raven. The little girl appeared to be confused for a couple of seconds until something in her brain clicked and a big smile appeared on her face.

"Mommy Raven!" Ruby exclaimed with a toothy grin.

"Look at those speaking skills." Raven shook her head, amused. "And mommy? I think I'm more an aunt than a mom to you."

But Ruby defiantly shook her head. "Nope! Raven is Mommy too!"

"Yeah, yeah, sure." Raven waved off, still impressed with how Ruby's speaking skills had improved those last two days. "Come on, Ruby. Let's get you dressed and head for breakfast before Yang eats all of the strawberry jam."


	9. Chapter 9

It had been a week since Taiyang's return. Naturally Yang and Ruby pretty much freaked out, when they saw their shared father in such a messed up state. Their screaming was loud enough to wake up Summer, who too had a little freak-out session when she initially saw her shared husband. So it was pretty much up to Raven to calm everyone down. Taiyang would have helped if everyone else wouldn't have been busy being all over him.

Luckily everything had calmed down by now. Taiyang's recovery was going smoothly, the children were happy to see their father again and overall the Shao-Long-Rose family was living a happy, quiet life. Taiyang had been pretty surprised when he heard that Yang managed to unlock her aura and semblance all on her own and at such a young age. Like Summer, he initially suspected Raven of having something to do with this, but the woman vehemently denied having anything to do with this. The blonde however one hundred percent disapproved of Raven training her daughter already, even if the woman did it in a fashion that it would come over as a game. Surprisingly for the man, it was Summer who defended this course of action.

"Look, Tai," she said "I like this course of action as much as you, but" the woman had looked to the floor "it's better to start early. Sooner or later she will come after me again and there's a good chance she would target my family in order to get to me."

Of course, when Summer spoke of "she", Taiyang knew that his second wife was referring to Salem. And as much as he loathed to admit it, the woman in the white cloak had a pretty good point. There was virtually nothing the "Grimm Maiden" and her ragtag band of lunatics weren't ready to do in order to achieve their goals. Going after someone's family? That wouldn't even make it in the top twenty of worst things they had ever done to anybody.

Sighing in defeat, Taiyang had slumped down in a patch of grass and watched as his two daughters were playing tag with one another. Of course Ruby had trouble keeping up with Yang, given that the smaller girl was still learning how to properly run. Summer placed herself right next to her husband, who was wearing fresh bandages and put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. Raven in the meantime was leaning against a tree, busy carving a stake out of a thick branch, which had fallen off the tree she was leaning against. When the children came near her, she held up her arms, as to not accidentally hurt them. Yang just happened to jump out of the way, as Ruby was throwing her tiny body against her sister. Missing her target completely, the small redhead stumbled over her own feet and landed with an "oof" on Raven's stomach. The woman rolled her red eyes, placing the tools she had been holding on the ground, before helping the redhead back up to her feet.

"Come on, Ruby. Go get her," Raven told Summer's daughter, sending her off with a light shove. The girl stumbled but managed to catch herself in time. She laughed while chasing after her blonde sister, who just grinned and waited for the last possible moment, before running away again.

Taiyang, having watched his first wife's action, couldn't help but frowned a little. "This still weirds me out, you know?" he told Summer. "The words Raven and family just don't fit the same picture, no matter how I twist and turn it."

"Oh Tai." Summer laughed lightly. "Raven may act all tough and she is pretty tough. You have to be when you live together with bandits." A small sigh escaped her lips. "But family has always been the most important thing to her. Previously her tribe had been her family, one she owed her life to."

Taiyang winced at the mention of the now non-existent bandit tribe. It brought up memories about a certain "incident", something that the entire family avoided talking about to the best of each individual's abilities.

"And now, the only ones she has left is us?" Tai asked rhetorically, to which Summer nodded none-the-less.

"Having a what we consider to be "normal life" is still new to her, but she's adapting fairly well. We should be happy that she is actually giving us all a chance to show her that strength can come from many places."

Another sigh escaped Taiyang. "Always the optimist, huh?"

Summer giggled and gave her husband a quick peck on the cheek. "I don't remember you being a pessimist?"

The man smiled lightly, scratching the back of his head. "I guess all the itchy bandages are souring my mood." He raised his left arm and looked down on the white wrapped limb. "Kinda reminds me of the old days. Remember that one time, where we got sent to Mistral?"

Summer facepalmed while laughing. "Oh god, why? Why do you have to bring that up?!"

Taiyang smiled evilly. "Hey, it wasn't my fault you lost the bet! Besides, it was your idea in the first place? And I gotta admit, it was pretty sexy seeing you two fighting in nothing more than lingerie." Tai rolled over laughing. Summer in response pulled her white hood over her head and hid her blush under it.

Raven, who had listened in to the conversation, blushed a little herself. Looking back, she blamed stupid teenager hormones for even going through with this. And probably just a spark of overconfidence had something to do with this as well.

Shaking her head, the black haired woman looked over at her daughter and watched her play with Summer's child. Yang's overall mood had gradually increased over the week as well. She wasn't as frowny as she had been seven days ago, but there were still differences in her behavior compared to the usual. For one, the girl appeared to be… "toned down" was the phrase Raven was going with. The blonde appeared to be toned down, whenever she and her mother were alone together. And the mother couldn't just excuse this behavior with a single nightmare anymore. Something was up with her daughter, at least Raven assumed something was up. Raising a single child was still completely new to her, so this might just be a little phase or something. Besides, everywhere else Yang was acting completely normal and she even went along with the training that Raven was slowly laying out for the girl. Granted the hardest part was still far away, as the woman knew she couldn't just bring the girl to start pulling boulders around. At least as long as either Tai or Summer were in the house.

XXX

After playing tag for who knows how long, Ruby had felt the sudden need to "go potty". While Summer went with the younger girl inside the house, Yang was left outside waiting with her biological mother for the others to return. Her father at some point had fallen asleep during the game and was snoring lightly, as the sun was shining down on his body. A small smile graced Yang's lips when she saw her dad being so carefree, despite the injuries he received during a mission. Sadly, Yang was kind of used to seeing her dead come home with at least some minor injuries. As an experienced huntsman he would often get the more dangerous jobs and at times was away from home for weeks. It had the side effect that Ruby and Yang learned first aid, while they patched up their father in the past.

The blonde girl frowned when the words "in the past" crossed her mind. At this point, she couldn't refute it anymore. The chance that everything she was experiencing was nothing more than a dream was slim to none. She got hungry, she felt pain, she needed to use the bathroom, she could make out individual leaves on a tree, her mother's hand felt warm on her forehead, whenever the woman woke her up… There were a lot of things that one usually didn't experience in a dream. Plus there was the fact that it had been seven days. There was no way she was capable of sleeping for that long. Something weird was going on. Something beautifully weird, even if that wasn't a real term in any way shape or form.

She looked over to her mother, who appeared to be busy sharpening a butterfly knife. Raven was something that caused Yang to have a wide variety of feelings. After all, this was the same woman who just left her for no apparent reason and now all of the sudden she was here right in front of her. Only a couple of meters away. If it weren't for the fact that Summer Rose of all people was alive and well, Raven being here in Patch would be on the top spot of weirdest things that Yang had ever experienced in her entire life.

The girl looked up at the sky, watching a cloud passing by. As mentioned, she had no freaking idea what was going on. Even when she overcame the initial shock and started thinking about everything that was going on, Yang found herself still being none the wiser about anything, really. So far she had been going with the flow and if she was honest with herself, she really started enjoying everything. Just now, playing tag with little Ruby. It was a ton of fun simply playing this mindless game and forgetting everything and everyone for a short amount of time. It was easy too, given that the past days and weeks had been hell, everyone would be tempted to simply accept this new reality.

The young girl walked over to her mother, who was eyeing the sharpened knife with a critical eye. When the mother noticed her daughter approaching, she sheathed the knife back into the sheath, which she had attached beneath the clothes on her leg and gave the blond a small smile.

"Hey, little dragon," Raven greeted her daughter, who stopped as soon as she heard those words. For a couple of seconds, all Yang did was looking at her mother with an unreadable expression. Raven's smile disappeared and was replaced with a questioning gaze.

"Is something the matter?" the mother asked her daughter, tilting her head.

Yang didn't answer verbally. Instead, she looked at her mother for a couple of more seconds, before moving over to the older woman. Raven watched with interest as her daughter not only sat down right next to her but also leaned her tiny head against the black haired woman. A smile reappeared on the mother's face and she put a hand on the blonde's head. Raven could feel Yang tensing up from the touch, which wasn't a surprise anymore at this point. With how often Raven had messed up Yang's hair this past week and given how riled up the girl had gotten every time that happened, it was easy to deduce that the little girl was rather fond of her golden crown, so to speak. Slowly and methodically Raven went with her fingers through her daughter's hair, which only appeared to make the four-year-old even tenser. At least that was the case for the first couple of seconds. Raven had been sure she would get some kind of complaint from her daughter, yet surprisingly the blonde began to relax under the touch of her mother. The young girl wrapped her small arms around her mother to the best of her abilities.

"What, are you tired already?" Raven asked in a teasing tone. Yang let out a grunting noise and placed her head on her mother's stomach. Said mother went from stroking Yang's head to stroking the back of the young girl.

"I'm really growing soft," Raven silently muttered to herself. "If I don't get some action soon, I'll-"

The tender moment was suddenly interrupted by a loud roar coming from the nearby forest. Both Yang and Raven jumped up, upon hearing the all too familiar scream. It was followed by another roar and an Ursa Grim coming out of the forest. The creature was headed directly towards the house.

"Speak of the Grim and he shall appear," Raven amusedly spoke out loud, dusting off her pants. "This shouldn't take long." Since Raven had left her sword in the house, a mistake as she mentally noted, she could either kill the Grim with a butterfly knife or her bare hands.

The Ursa roared at the approaching woman and charged right at her. Raven decided to give her daughter a little treat. When it looked like the Grim was about to hit Raven, the woman turned into a bird of the same name and took off into the sky. The swipe attack from the Grim went nowhere. As the creature was still wondering where its supposed prey had disappeared to, Raven already had acquired significant altitude. Once she reached a certain height, she transformed back into a human and dropped back to the ground. The Ursa looked up just in time to see a boot falling directly onto its face. With a sickening crunch, Raven pressed the face of the creature into the neck, after which she jumped off the thing. The rest of the body fell to the side and soon began to disappear into a black mist.

Inside the house, Ruby was cheering on her second mother from a window, while being held by her mother. Summer noted that Tai had slept through the entire ordeal. Oh well, it's not like Raven would need any help with a single Grim. Shaking her head, Summer carried Ruby back outside, the little girl still cheering on her "second mother".


End file.
